Rook(30)

“Chess?” Spear repeated.

“Why, yes,” Sophia replied. “Chess.” She offered Spear a bowl. “Creamed peas?”

Spear took the bowl, visibly confused, though not nearly as confused as she was. René was very deliberately removing her from the hook, and she could not fathom why. But by pulling her off, he was also sticking another straight through the chest of her brother. LeBlanc had lost interest in their conversation, his pale eyes watching every bite that went into Tom’s mouth.

“Yes,” Sophia said again, addressing René and the whole table at once. “You have caught me out, I’m afraid. I couldn’t wait to tell them. It must have been humiliating to be beaten so many times. And so thoroughly.”

René smiled. “Except for that once.”

“Yes,” she agreed, meeting the blue fire of his eyes, “except for that once. Isn’t that right, Tom?” Her brother looked up from his plate, where he had been deep in thought. “Tom was acting as chaperone, poor man.”

“He has always been an excellent son,” said Bellamy.

“Thank you, Father,” Tom said.

“Did you ever get any sleep, Tom?” Sophia continued. “There was that one game, it must have been just before nethermoon?”

“Just after, I think,” Tom replied. He looked from Sophia to LeBlanc, who had stopped eating his own creamed peas and was now intent on the conversation. Tom’s brows came down, and Sophia knew he had just seen his danger.

“Yes, just after nethermoon,” Sophia agreed. “Tell them about it, René.”

René launched into an explanation of a game that Sophia recognized to be the only one they had ever actually played, after dinner in the sitting room. This speech was so boring in its precise description of every piece and move, and at the same time such a perfect homage to René’s own cleverness, that Sophia had to admit the whole thing was a stroke of genius. She watched Spear’s face go from incredulous to blank, saw LeBlanc cutting his potatoes into painstaking fourths, her father yawning behind his napkin. She wasn’t sure anyone even remembered what they’d been talking about.

Sophia pushed the food around her plate, trying to pretend she had eaten some of it. The pain in her skull was increasing, the smell of the fish making her ill. And she had no idea what was happening.

“That is all so very instructive, René,” LeBlanc interrupted suddenly, dabbing at his mouth. “But as a member of your family, I think I must point out to you the bad manners of bragging, especially at the expense of your fiancée. You would be sorry, I’m sure, if I had to speak to your mother about it.”

It was the first time Sophia had ever known Spear and LeBlanc to be in agreement. But when she turned to René, she was surprised to see that this mild threat had actually carried weight. René’s smile had tightened, like the grip on his fork.

“My apologies, Cousin,” he said quietly, “and Miss Bellamy.”

His gaze ran once over hers. He looked away again, but not before she had noticed his look linger pointedly for just a moment on her side, the side closest to him. Sophia wrapped her arms around herself, as if she were chilly, squirming her fingers around until she felt a wet patch. Blood. Not much, but it was soaking through. She wiped her fingers discreetly on her napkin and folded it inward, smiling at them all, her head full of words she could not politely utter.

“Though I am glad you brought the particular subject to mind, Cousin,” LeBlanc was saying. “Because I wished to ask—”

“Monsieur Hammond,” René interrupted. Spear looked up, scowling. “Would you find a shawl for Miss Bellamy? She is coming all out in …” He turned to her. “What is the word, my love? Swan skin?”

“Gooseflesh, I believe he means,” Sophia explained. “I’m afraid I didn’t dress warmly enough.” She ignored the instant glances this statement caused to be directed at her bosom; she was too busy trying and failing to understand why René was shielding her. A shawl would cover the spreading bloodstain at her side.

“I have always thought my daughter should dress more warmly,” Bellamy muttered.

René was still talking to Spear. “Perhaps the woman Nancy, or …”

Sophia supplied the name. “Orla. Would you mind finding Orla, Spear? She’ll know which shawl to send.”

“Of course,” Spear said, looking much less thunderous now that Sophia was the one asking. He left the room in a fast, booted stomp.

“I was saying,” LeBlanc continued, taking in every moment of their little drama, “that I would also like to discuss last night.” He took a sip of wine, his signet ring with the seal of the city flashing in the light. “I would like to discuss the person who was in my room.”

The clink of plate and glass stopped. Tom spoke first. “But I thought you weren’t interested in that, Monsieur LeBlanc. You called off the hunt.”

“So I did,” he replied. “But that is because we were hunting the wrong man.”

“How so?”

“Because the man I am looking for is wounded, Monsieur, and there was no blood trail to go with the scent.”

“Wounded?” said René incredulously. “Really, Cousin.”